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WELL ROUNDED MESSAGE OF PERSEVERANCE AND COMMITMENT DEMONSTRATED DURING HOOKED ON SCHOOL WEEK

MONTREAL, FEBRUARY 17, 2014 – During this year’s fourth annual Hooked on School Week, which took place from February 10 to 14, educators from all regions of Quebec came together to showcase the sheer importance of school perseverance and supporting youth in their efforts to succeed.

“The Hooked on School Week is about mobilizing the entire community around school perseverance,” stated Naomi Thériault, Agente de liaison et de développement from Réseau Réussite Montréal. “We think it’s important that people know that it’s more than just a school thing. It’s about community, parents, teachers and the like. It’s to stress that it’s really everybody’s business to keep kids in school. That is our main focus this week and what we want to get people aware of.”

The week kicked off at the Société Des Arts Technologiques where speeches were given and the importance of the white and green ribbon was explained. Keynote speeches from students with success stories were heard and applauded by audience members.

Later that day, Rosemount High School (3737 Beaubien Street East) had the pleasure of welcoming Americas Got Talent finalist, singer and songwriter Taylor Mathews.

“You have all the right tools within the community of a high school to make any dream or goal possible, ” Mathews explained. “You just have to create it. You have to stop looking so much on the outside of what you don’t have and realize what you do have because you can make a lot out of it.”

On Tuesday, Lester B. Pearson High School (11575 P.M. Favier) in Montreal North, home to the English Montreal School Board`s Sport-Études program, hosted the Montreal Alouettes.

“It is great to reach young people with a positive message,” said linebacker Kyries Hebert. “I think it is important to talk about perseverance and how we had to work hard in order to become the players and people that we are today.”

Thursday was another eventual day for Lester B. Pearson High School, as the students in the Sport-Études program played hockey against the local police force.

“This is a great step to building good community relations with the city and making our students better citizens,” stated Principal Pelagia Nickoletopoulos. “This is one of the activities that we are doing for the fourth annual Hooked on School Week. It emphasizes to our students that if they connect to something in school that keeps them motivated, they will achieve their goals. We want them to aim high and we know that if they persevere they can achieve whatever goal they have.”

Since 2011, hundreds of organizations from the educational, community, institutional and business sectors have joined the movement every year in Montreal.